SO YOU'VE DECIDED to fish green drakes this summer. On a western river, preferably. Good for you. It's an incredible hatch that too often gets overlooked for the more glorious salmonfly. Is your significant other coming along? Does he or she fish? Wait, a better question: Does your partner like to do anything other than fish? Because green drakes often hatch in the middle of summer, when pressure is high to make the dreaded "combo trip." (Flyfishing and a couples retreat!) Problem is, if you're serious about green drakes, then you'll be choosing between iffy vaykay towns like Island Park, Sisters, Ennis, or Encampment.

FROM THE SICKLE'S CURVE of Great Abaco Island's eastern shore, the next piece of solid ground for 3,500 miles is the African continent. Between those shores lies ample room for inspiration. This is perhaps why noted American sporting artist Vaughn Cochran called a summit. "Years ago, when I managed fishing lodges, I had this idea to invite artists to gather and do a symposium," Cochran said. "I thought to myself, 'If I ever own a lodge, I'm going to do this.'"

Dan caught the only inconnu. Let's get that out of the way. "Dan" is Dan Armstrong, a well-traveled, Bozeman-based photographer who occasionally gets invited on spectacular fishing trips with the tacit understanding that his job is to record the heroics of the writer and keep his hands off the rod. But it was our last day in the Yukon and we had yet to try for inconnu—AKA sheefish, AKA "connie," AKA an overgrown whitefish that has somehow managed to parlay rareness and mediocre fighting ability into a Sasquatch-like mystique and the hyperbolic nickname: "tarpon of the north."

I'm sitting in Bob Mitchell's Fly Shop in St. Paul, Minnesota, watching Brian Bergeson tie a fly. His thread wraps are quick and confident. He trims a tightly bound clump of bucktail and a plume of hair rises and settles to the table. His Red Bull sits safely outside the fallout radius. His fingers seem to operate on micro muscle-memory rather than direct control. Over the course of a half hour, as we talk about muskies and the flies he ties for them, a pair of bare hooks develops into a twelve-inch black-and-orange streamer.

One night during my sophomore year of college, a drunk Swedish exchange student sunk into my couch and began telling tales of the old country. Midsommar's Eve is a special event in June, Henrick said, when all able-bodied citizens eat and drink till they can't. He reminisced about his first Midsommar's kiss, first Midsommar's beer, first Midsommar's sex.